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From The Mailbag

Rep. John Murtha died Monday of
complications from gall bladder surgery
Nineteen-term Congressman John Murtha [D-PA] died of complications from gall bladder surgery on Monday, Feb. 8, 2010. He was 77 years old. The Pennsylvania Congressman arrogantly had an airport built in his hometown of Johnstown, PA so he could fly home every night. Murtha steered $189 million of taxpayer money to the project so he could have his own personal airport. The people in Johnstown love it, but the people in the other 49 States who paid for a $189 million airport for a handful of people aren't estatic about it.

While the media tends to be nice to fallen politicians, remembering Murtha not as an arrogant, pork-swilling politician but as a decorated Vietnam Marine Corp officer war hero (which he was) is hard because he became an antiwar advocate who hypocritically used his ribbons and medals only to win re-election. Murtha was elected to the US House of Representatives in a special election by less than 250 votes on Feb. 5, 1974 after the death of 12-term Republican Congressman John P. Saylor who died on Oct. 28, 1973. It is likely, if she opts to seek his 12th Congressional District seat in November, that Diana Irey [R] will win Murtha's seat.

Sadly, as he grew accustomed to power, Murtha began to see himself as a lord and not a commoner congressman chosen by the people of Pennsylvania to represent them and the "people's interest" in the nation's capital. While the media touted him as a champion of the men in uniform, nothing could be farther from the truth once Murtha joined the establishment. He became a political magnet for the antiwar, anti-American movement. He was the social progressive's favorite warrior. Expecting the right to castigate Murtha's memory by calling him antiwar names, the Workers' World (formerly the communist Daily Worker) praised Murtha as a man dedicated to ending the war in the Mideast and bringing all US troops out of Iraq.

For better or worse, John Patrick "Jack" Murtha is past criticism from friends, foes and even his peers on both sides of the aisle. The tall, gruff-mannered former Marine Lt. Colonel now faces the only judge who matters.

Two lawyers and a lobbyist take the 5th when
asked to explain their roles in funneling millions of
dollars from foreign-based clients to politicians.
The Obama Administration is attempting to kill two birds with one stone by undoing the the US Supreme Court's recent decision to overturn McCain-Feingold (officially the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002) when the high court ruled on Citizens United v Federal Election Commission, effectively overturned two precedents: Austin v Michigan Chamber of Commerce a 1990 case that restricted corporations from supporting or opposing political candidates and McConnell v Federal Election Commission a 2003 decision that upheld the legality of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act.

The two threats facing Obama begin with his need to thwart the potential threat of a major Republican takeover of both the House and Senate in 2010, and his need to find enough evidence to smear Republicans sufficiently to assure his re-election as President in 2012. At the same time, he needs to figure out how to sidestep the US Supreme Court and reinstate the restrictions banning corporate donors from contributing money to GOP or Independent candidates in 2010 and 2012 while labor unions and Super PACs use legal loopholes that were deliberately built into McCain=Feingold that let groups like the Trial Lawyers Association ()which underwent a name change in 2006 to the American Association for Justice), and several behemoth liberal PACs which are far more flush with cash than many of the corporations targeted by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act who traditionally back rule-of-law candidates.

In many cases, major donors like SEIU and ACORN (now recently rebranded as Community Organizers International™), have far more financial liquidity because too much of the money in their coffers comes from the pockets of the taxpayers of the United States in the form of grants that cannot, by law, be used for political purposes, or from union dues which also, by law, cannot be used for political purposes without the consent of the union members—although both commonly, and arrogantly, are used to advocate for or against political candidates.

When the US Supreme Court decided in favor of Citizens United against the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act on Jan. 21, 2010, the Democratic Party was stunned since the decision signaled a sharp doctrinal shift in favor of genuine free political speech by the Roberts Court. It was such a devastating setback for the Cloward-Pivens social progressives that, during Obama's State of the Union address on Jan. 27, the Resident decided to attack the US Supreme Court for its 5-to-4 decision. Obama, looking directly at the nine Justices, threw down the gauntlet and made it clear that he would find a way around their Citizens United v Federal Election Commission decision.

In the meantime, using traditional Cloward-Pivens tactics, far left Sen. Carl Levin [D-MI], Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Permanent Subcommittee launched a new investigation of influence buying by foreign governments tied to superlobbyist Jack Abramoff, as the Democrats desperately search for a brush broad enough to smear both GOP incumbents and potential GOP candidates. Like everything else the Democrats do, their "investigations" are always narrowly focused on the leadership of the opposition rather than simply to investigate graft and political corruption wherever it's found, committee by members of either or both political parties. On Feb. 4, 2010, in order to justify McCain-Feingold which was just overturned as unconstitutional, Levin outlined what he called "glaring gaps" in federal money-laundering laws that allow foreign governments to channel millions of dollars of illicit cash into the country and into the hands of powerful DC lawyers and lobbyists who represent their interests. The illicit cash is then laundered to make it appear that its coming from legitimate US corporations. Clearly the only way to stop illegal campaign contributions is to outlaw all contributions over $100 to anyone in, or running for, public office. Mandatory prison sentences must be imposed not only on the politician who receives quid pro quo gratuities (which all corporate or PAC political contributions are), but also on the lawyer or lobbyist who does the hand-off, the corporate and PAC official who passes the money to the lawyer and the corporate CEO and all of the Board members who give a nod to contributions for access to politicians and the right to stick their hands into the pockets of the taxpayers.

Individual contributions need to be limited to $100.00. And Congress needs to be banned by the US Supreme Court from using taxpayer money to fund political special interest groups that lobby on behalf of political parties. The practice needs to be outlawed, and all special interest groups who use taxpayer money to survive must be shut down and all of their assets seized and returned to the taxpayers. The reason? Because the special interest groups who are financed by taxpayer dollars are never pro-Constitution or pro-US citizen groups. All of the special interest groups who exist on taxpayer dollars are anti-taxpayer and usually anti-American.

Of course, Levin's committee was not really universally investigating political corruption. He knows where it's headquartered, and he knows the K Street addresses where quid pro quo dollars are available up because every politician in Washington knows which lawyers and lobbyists on K Street dole out questionable money based on the quid pro quo that's attached to the greenbacks. Levin's committee is investigating only what he thinks will embarrass Republicans in an election year—even though Levin knows all of the "new" money from lobbyists who are pushing legislation (which is usually written by the lobbyist and/or the benefactor who also writes the checks) is going to members of his party (the Democrats) since they control the movement, or lack of movement, of every piece of legislation in Congress. And, since January, 2009, they have had such dictatorial control over Congress that the Democratic leadership arrogantly enacted a rule that forced Republicans in the House or Senate to argue their positions against the left's social progressive legislation to an empty chamber so that the Democrats would not have to listen to conservative tirades against their bills.

Playing the role of the concerned American (but not doing it well), Levin pompously raised a question in his interview with the Associated Press in which he asked: "How can the United States tell other countries to stop the flow of illegal money when we don't do a better job of it within our own borders? Stopping the flow of illegal money is critical because foreign corruption damages civil society, undermines the rule of law and threatens American security." Yes, that's true. Levin's statement, on the other hand, also seemed to imply that domestic corruption doesn't threaten American security. At least, in the view of the social progressives, when that corruption fills the campaign coffers or freezers of Democratic Congressmen and Senators.

Looking into illegal foreign contributions, the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Permanent Subcommittee chose to ignore the Saudi and Chinese money laundered through the Internet by what was allegedly ACORN members purportedly keystroking $150 million in contributions into donor increments of $100 or less to make them appear like they were contributions from common working class people (which many were) who do not really have to be identified.

The problem found by the Republican Party centered around what could only be construed to be anonymous donor since the donor names were bogus. Among the phony monikers were Dooddad Pro, whose address was listed as a Nundo, NY liquor store; or Good Will, whose address was for a Goodwill Industries store in Austin, TX. Without looking at hundreds of other make believe names like Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Family Guy, O.J. Simpson, King Kong, Daffy Duck, Bart Simpson and just about every comic strip character in the Sunday funnies. When they ran out of cartoon characters, they simply harvested letters from the alphabet and threw them together in no particular order, creating weird-looking nonsensical names like Xyquris Xysoureeldh or Griexrhd Rklsfentl. Newsmax discovered that the first two: Doodad Prop and Good Will each made over 1,000 donations to the Obama Campaign. Newsmax also reported that the Federal Election Commission questioned the Obama Campaign about the 1,000 contributions made by Doodad Pro and Good Will, but didn't see anything wrong with Family Guy, King Kong, Bart Simpson, Mickey Mouse, Daffy Duck or any of the other made up names, including those which were random letters that formed no real names.

Yet, Levin and the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Permanent Subcommittee feel that the United States is threatened more by Jack Abramoff, who pleaded guilty to fraud charges in 2006 than by the Muslim world and People's Republic of China because the Abramoff scandal ended the political career of House Majority Whip Tom DeLay [R-TX] who resigned to keep his name from being used by the social progressives to tar and feather his colleagues. When the dust settled from the congressional investigation in 2006, one congressman, Bob Ney [R-OH] was convicted for taking quid pro quo contribution from Abramoff to get gaming rights for the Tiguas Indian Tribe. Also convicted were nine lobbyists. Levin and the far left hope that new dirt, or rather old dirt from a new investigation, will tarnish the Republicans enough to demoralize the independents and make them sit out the midterm election of 2010.

The 330-page report did not even remotely hint at indiscretions by Democrats but focused exclusively on foreign leaders from places like Equatorial Guinea and the Republic of Gabon who used a variety of lawyers, lobbyists, bankers, and an assortment of entrepreneurs in private industry to create shell companies in the United States where Gabon president Omar Bongo and Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mangue, the son of Equatorial Guinea president Teodoro Nguema Obiang Mbasago and Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar used those shell companies to buy influence. Nigeria funneled some $14 million to American University through two offshore corporations to pay for consulting services.

Levin's committee was pushing for a George W. Bush connection they could use to smear the Republican Party or, at the least, something they could definitively link to either the Republican House or Senate Campaign Committee. The closest they could get was testimony from someone on the Indian Affairs Committee in 2005 who testified that Abramoff told him he offered Bongo a meeting with Bush-43 for $9 million. Abramoff was not asked about the meeting, which took place ten months later in the Oval Office. And, there is no evidence that anyone paid anyone in the Bush-43 Administration a Clinton-style campaign contribution for access to the White House. On Sept. 21, 2006 when Abramoff was on trial, the White House released its logs of every Abramoff visit to the Oval Office, of which there were seven. In an attempt to paint himself closer to Bush than he really was, Abramoff told close associates on the Hill that he had visited the White House on 17 separate occasions. Former Abramoff underlings Neil Volz and Tony Rudy were admitted to the White House 18 and 13 times, respectively. However, Abramoff's additional 10 visits and those logged into the Executive offices in the White House by Volz and Rudy were aparently to see staffers, not the President.

Two lawyers who were called to testify about the activities of the African nations leaders, Michael Berger and George Nagler and lobbyist Jeffrey Birrell, a registered lobbyist for the Republic of Gabon, invoked their 5th Amendment rights and were excused from testifying by Levin.

The most frightening aspect of the committee's 330 page report is that Levin urged the US Treasury to adopt, and place into the US Code, recent guidelines adopted by the World Bank. The social progressives still haven't gotten it. According to the Constitution of the United States the laws of the United States are created by lawfully elected legislators in the House and Senate. That legislation becomes law through a process which requires the debate and vote in both Houses and, if constitutionally enacted by both Houses and signed into law by the nation's Chief Executive, they then become part of the codified rule of law which governs our nation. Departments within the Executive Branch of government do not have the a constitutional prerogative to self-legislate by simply codifying the regulations of the United Nations and the World Bank—even if the social progressive head of a Senate committee thinks it's a good idea. The regulations, according to a Washington Times report "...would create stronger controls over foreign officials and repeal anti-money laundering exemptions." Take it to the bank, implementing such a rule as a regulatory process that did not require congressional legislation would ultimately repeal anti-money laundering exemptions only for those not in power—and then only if those being investigated are conservatives.

States now challenging Obamacare
For what it's worth, it's nice to see the States are beginning to challenger Obamacare—(HR 3200) America's Affordable Heath Choices Act of 2009—by either filing suit in federal court or by introducing legislation that challenges the authority of the federal government to steal 1/7 of the US economy. Bob Marshall, GOP member of the Virginia House of Delegates introduced HB 10, the Virginia Health Care Freedom Act. On his personal website Marshall noted that the States have the constitutional right to challenge laws that illegally force them to pay for federal financial dictates. The States not only have the prerogative but an inherent responsibility to challenge laws which either unfairly and punitively tax, or exempt select groups of people or organizations favored by those in power, from being taxed.

Marshall noted that HR 3200, now in joint conference, "...will force Americans who do not have health care to purchase it or face a fine of at least $1,900 with penalties as high as $25,000 and up to a year in jail. Penalties kick in if the taxpayer misses a single payment." Marshall said: "The primary responsibility for the economic welfare of families and adult individuals rests with families and adult individuals, not Washington politicians. Our Declaration..." (which will serve as a 2010 version of the 1798 Virginia and Kentucky Resolves written by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison that reiterated that the States are sovereign over the federal government. The Virginia and Kentucky Resolves abdicated the Alien and Sedition Act of 1791 since the federal government did not have authority under the Constitution to enact them) "...states that governments receive their 'just power to govern from the governed,' and further, that it is 'the right of the People,' not elected or appointed officials, to structure government, 'in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.' Obamacare proponents in Congress are purposing healthier 'solutions' which abolish our natural right of self-determination to make primary decisions for our economic welfare. America's Founders held that it was both the right and duty of citizens to resist Government which usurps rights given to us by our Creator. Obamacare is not a battle over health insurance. It is a struggle over whether America will remain a nation of self-directing citizens or docile, powerless serfs."

Twenty-seven states have now either filed, or are considering filing, lawsuits and/or legislation to end Obamacare before it begins. Thirteen States Attorneys Generals have filed lawsuits demanding that Congress remove Sen. Ben Nelson's [D-NE]'s double-dipped sweetheart deal that begins with the US taxpayers being forced to foot 100% of any healthier cost increases which the people of Nebraska will never have to pay. We will pay it for them as part of the deal he struck with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Add to that the $100 million dollars we will pay to complete the remodeling on the Bellevue Veteran's Hospital in Bellevue, Nebraska and it should become clear how Reid got several of the 60 votes he needed to move Obamacare through the process to the final simply majority vote for passage. Sadly, even if the States who are suing win their lawsuit and the Senate kills the bribes to both Congressmen and Senators in the legislation, win, the only thing they will win is seeing those appropriations, which are bribes, killed. The votes cast for passage will remain as votes cast for passage. They will not be erased or reversed because they were purchased with bribes. Hopefully the people in Nebraska will fire Nelson in 2012, and the people of Louisiana will fire Mary Landrieu in 2014 and Arkansans will fire Sen. Blanche Lincoln in November. All of them, knowing their constituents opposed a communist-style healthcare system in the United States voted for it. When signed into law, that plan, under Medicare and the Veteran's Administration, will allow unelected bureaucrats (based on the provisions in HR 1, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (where Congress hid it) to euthanize them—or their parents or grandparents—as worthless drains on the assets of the State.

More than a dozen states are now putting constitutional amendments on their primary ballots to reverse any federal law that would require citizens of those States to purchase health plans. The initiatives will protect the private health insurance markets in those States. Those States expect a court battle with the federal government. History, with honest federal judges, has actually sided with the States based on the Kentucky and Virginia Resolves which makes it clear to the federal government that the States, not the federal government, are sovereign. However, judges are now appointed based on their political pedigrees and not their understanding of constitutional law. Before being appointed to the federal bench, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor was a failed assistant DA in the Bronx. She never sat on the bench—not even in a municipal court. Nor could she make it as a county prosecutor.

The 27 States which are challenging the Obama Administration's right to seize the healthcare industry and mandate that people buy insurance or face a fine and possible imprisonment need to copy Virginia's complaint—not as a law within their State, but as a constitutional resolution to the federal government just as Jefferson and Madison did in 1798 with the Virginia and Kentucky Resolves to vacate John Adams' Aliens and Sedition Act of 1791. Just as the Aliens and Sedition Act of 1791 violated both the 9th and 10th Amendments so does the Affordable Heath Choices Act of 2010. It is time, once again, that we remind the federal government that we are the Lords...they are the serfs. They work for us.